A Time to Die by Barbara Nadel

Author:Barbara Nadel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Allison & Busby
Published: 2020-08-04T16:00:00+00:00

In general, the kids didn’t like John much. Some of the grandkids ran away from him. And who could blame them? A stern figure to say the least, he wasn’t what anyone would call friendly in spite of the soft, almost cuddly American accent. The exception to this rule was the five-year-old whirlwind that was Mickey Jay. Son of Tina, one of Des’s kids, Mickey Jay was a bright boy, always asking questions. In his own way he was as irritating as John. But somehow the little kid and the man from America got on – sort of.

‘What you reading, Uncle John?’

Brenda heard the boy’s gruff little voice from the kitchen. John hated it when the kids called him ‘uncle’, which was probably why Mickey Jay did it. Bright he may be, but he was an annoying little bugger and he knew it and used it.

‘Oi!’ Brenda called out. ‘Mickey Jay, leave John alone to read his paper!’

There was a moment of silence, then some giggling, then she heard the child, in a stage whisper, say, ‘Do you want me to bugger off, Uncle John?’

Little shit!

But then she heard John say, ‘No. No it’s all right. But you just sit down quietly next to me.’

Mickey Jay liked being close to adults. If Brenda had a moment to herself on the sofa and he was about he always came and joined her. He’d sat with John, curled into his side, thumb in his mouth, a few times now. It probably came, Brenda sometimes thought, of all the times his mum had brought men home and asked that her son instantly take to, if not love, them.

Unlike Ruby who could play and use men, Tina was very needy. She’d got pregnant with Mickey Jay when she was fifteen as a way, in part, to keep hold of the boy she was going out with at the time. Of course, he’d buggered off almost immediately. But he’d been followed by a succession of ‘daddies’ who had always started spoiling the kid when they wanted to get in with his mother and then ignored him when they wanted to move on to some other girl. Brenda had to remind herself that Tina was still only twenty on a daily basis – because that was how often she had to look after Mickey Jay sometimes. The girl had gone out with her mates on Saturday night, dropping the kid off at Brenda’s on her way. Now Mickey Jay was hanging around John of all people, while his mother was, no doubt, in bed somewhere with some other loser.

Brenda heard the child say, ‘Who’s that?’

She heard John’s paper rustle. Then he said, ‘That’s the president of America.’

Obviously looking at the many, many photos of Donald Trump that would be all over papers like The Times.

‘That’s where you come from, ain’t it?’ Mickey Jay said.

‘No. I come from here originally, Britain,’ John said. ‘I just lived in America a very long time. And it isn’t “ain’t” it’s isn’t.

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